The construction of the bindings of a set of musical manuscripts from the mid-seventeenth century of the General Library of the University of Coimbra

Abstract

The “Cartapácios” of the Monastery of Santa Cruz of Coimbra are a priceless set of mid-17th century music manuscripts with flexible parchment covers. Belonging to the General Library’s musical collection, these manuscripts were in different stages of conservation and are now being restored in order to reverse older interventions and to stabilize the degradation processes detected. These extensive interventions have required an examination of the bindings, revealing some original workshop characteristics specific to the Coimbra Monastery and rare in Iberian parchment bindings from the same period of time. The author considers that this chapter in the history of bookbinding is still largely unstudied and that the descriptions presented here may contribute to future indispensable studies.